Star Wars: Battlefront II didn’t cover the expectations and microtransactions are coming back
Do you guys remember what happened when EA implemented an unfair microtransaction system to Star Wars: Battlefront II? How can we forget that right? Apparently, EA has calculated the income and decided that the game underperformed. And according to WSJ, microtransactions will be back “in the next few months.” What does that mean? Well, it means that EA will keep doing what they did in the past. Except this time, they will try to “do it right”.
So what happened exactly? EA had planned selling around 10 millions of copies but instead they only sold 9 million during its launch quarter. What is interesting is that 2015’s Battlefront reboot shipped around 13 million copies during the launch quarter. The gap between these two games are impressive. And we all know (or at least guess) why this happened, right?
In addition to that, in a Market Talk with WSJ, CFO Blake Jorgensen indicated that they “believed in microtransactions.” EA says that even after the loot-box disaster that was regarded as unfair by many gamers around the globe. But, this time they declared that they wanted to do it in a better way: “Going forward, we believe that live services that include optional digital monetization, when done right, provide a very important element of choice that can extend and enhance the experience in our games […]” says EA. They ‘claim’ that they are focused on the ‘gameplay experience’ but I do not know what to say about that statement. Yes, when it is done right, loot-boxes can be a important part of the game and it actually can enhance the core elements of it. However, when it is done wrong…well, we know what happens.
No matter what, it is good to see that a company like EA takes a step back and wants to make things better. And I personally hope that they will make things better. Or it will get even worse for them.
Time will tell what will happen of course. And we will hear more about this issue in the near future for sure.
So, stay tuned fellas!
